I was in sixth grade when I got my first bra, an almost-A cup, white polyester with a pink bow in the front and one hook in the back.

A girl’s first bra is a big deal, a milestone that invokes both pride and mortification.

There is the horror of shopping for one, the saleswoman at Sears with lipstick on her teeth measuring me with a tape measure and announcing sweetly, “27 ½.” I wanted to pinch her.

There is the awkwardness of the changes your body was going through but this joy that something – well, a little something – is happening. Finally.

In the middle-school world, the appearance of bra straps were new, definitive lines, across our backs and over our shoulders, between us and the boys. Something had changed.

The boys took notice.

They would come up behind us when our arms were full of books, run their fingers down our backs and then snap our bra straps, laughing and dancing backward out of reach.

If they actually managed to undo it, they’d ask if we needed help doing it back up.

The snapping stung. It was embarrassing and confusing. These boys were our friends, and suddenly they were acting like idiots — and paying us a lot more attention.

It wasn’t only me but a group of girls they targeted, and there were more of them than there were of us.

None of us told our parents or a teacher.

It starts and we stop talking

For virtually the same reasons we didn’t tell then, the women who came forward this month with sexual harassment, assault and rape allegations against one of the entertainment industry’s most powerful men didn’t tell at the time, either.

In comparison, boys snapping girls' bra straps doesn't seem like too big a deal. I mean, come on, we were just kids.

I wondered if it's relevant, and then I realized that it is.

Because it just starts with bra snapping in sixth-grade. For some women, it starts even earlier.

It starts then, and we don't tell. We don't talk about it.

And then we keep on not telling, and not talking about it,not when we get our first jobs and the restaurant manager grabs our butt whenever we bend over, not when we dodge the same kind of harassment throughout our careers, from people we work with or for, laughing off suggestive comments and catcalls, ignoring lewd jokes made at our expense, ducking hands in our hair, on our shoulders and in the small of our backs, whether we make minimum wage or run the place, in the elevator and parking garage, at nightclubs and gas stations, and in our own homes, and sometimes not even when the worst happens.

“A lot of times kids know in their hearts and minds that it is going to get worse if they tell, so they don’t say anything,” said Stephanie Orr, president of the Casa Center for Positive Social Change, formerly the Casa Center for Prevention of Abuse and Violence.

They don't tell, and they don't talk about it. It is the beginning of a pattern that can last a lifetime.

“It is reflected in the adult world, with what we are seeing now with the disclosures about Harvey Weinstein,” Orr said. “Most of them never told anyone because they felt it was going to reap worse repercussions if they told.

“And — this is constant — they didn’t think anyone would believe them.”

Her organization has taught sexual-abuse prevention courses in schools for more than 40 years.

One course about healthy relationships, which includes a discussion of 25 behaviors that constitute sexual harassment, was first offered in high schools, and then expanded to middle schools.

Now, at the request of teachers, it starts in fourth grade. Fourth grade.

The stories behind a hashtag

Earlier this month, the New York Times and the New Yorker published stories detailing allegations of rape, sexual assault and harassment by Hollywood producer Weinstein dating back decades.

More than 30 women have come forward since.

On Sunday on Twitter, actress Alyssa Milano encouraged women who had been sexually harassed or assaulted to write “#MeToo” on social media to illustrate how often this happens to women.

Me too.

Me too.

Me too.

By Tuesday, the #MeToo hashtag had been used 825,000 times. In less than 24 hours on Facebook, 4.7 million people around the world had posted “Me too” in conversations.

There is a story behind every post. Some women elaborated; some did not. Both are equally powerful. Men posted, too. Some women who had those experience choose not to post at all, and they are as brave as those who did.

We worry no one would believe us

I read through the posts, day after day, a roll call of heartbreak. I noticed how many were about middle school girls whose bras were snapped, how they were touched inappropriately just as they were changing from girls to women.

First time was when a guy popped my bra at school. I swung around and slapped him. Got sent to the office while he got high 5s. #MeToo

ex-friend/school mate used to sit behind me and open my bra during lessons. He thought he was being funny..

"boys will be boys" #metoo

#MeToo: Sixth grade. New girl in new school. Boys felt up my boobs and snapped my bra every. single. day. No one took no for an answer.

Orr remembers being that girl, excited about growing up and picking out a shirt snug enough to show she was wearing a bra but intimidated by the attention it brought. She didn’t say anything, either.

The reasons we don’t tell as kids are the same ones that keep us from telling throughout our lives.

We don’t want to be tattle tales, to get our friends in trouble, or hurt anyone’s feelings, not noticing that they hadn’t cared about ours. We worry about being ostracized and made fun of.

We worry no one would believe us.

And even if they do believe us, would we be blamed? Sometimes we thought that way, too. Did I do something to bring this on?

As adults, there was more at stake. We were humiliated and embarrassed. We worried about retaliation — 75 percent of people who report fear reprisal, according to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission — and losing our jobs, or a chance at a promotion.

We wanted to fit in, not to be that woman, overly sensitive, who couldn’t take a joke and made a fuss when it was no big deal.

And even when it clearly is a big deal, sometimes we still don’t tell.

And sometimes we know that people already knew, as in Harvey Weinstein’s case, and they did nothing.

So we play along to get along, and move on, feeling a little bit sick to our stomachs.

Not telling doesn’t feel good. But sometimes it feels safer.

A handout of examples of sexually harassing behaviors reported in schools.(Photo: The Casa Center for Positive Social Change)

If you say it, mean it

Tom Reardon has been teaching for Orr's organization since 1997, talking with more than 60,000 students during that time. These are difficult topics for adults, let alone children, but important.

The message is simple, and something we all learned starting in preschool: Keep your hands to yourself and talk nice. But it’s much more complex than that.

He starts by letting students brainstorm and writes their ideas on the board. They talk about calling someone a sexually charged name, such as “slut,” spreading rumors about someone’s sexual behavior, unwanted touching.

He explains the nuances, of how tapping someone on the shoulder may be fine but not rubbing their shoulders.

“It is the person who is receiving the attention who decides if it is sexual harassment or not,” he said. So he tells the students to ask first.

Because no one else has the right to touch you without your permission, and it is never OK to put your hands on someone else without their permission.

No really does means no. If you hear it, stop whatever it is that you are doing, Reardon said. And if you say no, mean it . Don't laugh in an attempt to be nice. This can send mixed messages.

They talk about how to speak up when they are uncomfortable, practicing phrases like, "I don't like the way you talk to me," or "Don’t touch me,” and how to ask for help.

And Reardon tells them that if they see something, they have a responsibility to say something, particularly when the victim can’t.

“We all have a responsibility to speak up when we see things happening, as hard as it is,” he said.

The students practice what they could say: “That’s not cool,” or “Don’t do that.” Online, they might write, “Your comment is out of line."

Reardon answers every question the students ask. He hopes they talk to their friends and families about it.

Because if they talk about it, maybe they will speak up. Maybe they will tell.

Time to speak up now

We didn’t talk about it when I was in sixth grade. We didn’t tell. But someone did.

The girls were called into the office, one at a time, asked if we were all right and told that what the boys had done was wrong, and it would stop.

The boys apologized and spent a Saturday cleaning the schoolyard. Maybe they learned they would not get away with that kind of behavior. Maybe they laughed about it.

I didn't tell about the bra snapping, or talk about it, and I wouldn't later when I was groped under a table at a wedding, or an editor made a lewd comment, or when my date, a friend of a friend, pinned me down in the front seat of his car and fumbled under my dress.

So I'm telling now, and talking about it, and listening to everyone else, telling and talking. Because this is how it starts.Maybe someday, this is how it will end.